thumb|Mitsubishi building in [[Marunouchi, early home of Mitsubishi Bank; possibly photographed upon completion in 1894]]
thumb|Mitsubishi Bank's head office building erected in 1922 across the street from the previous one, eventually demolished in 1977
thumb|The same building following enlargement in the 1930s
thumb|Mitsubishi Bank's more recent head office in [[Marunouchi, completed 1980 on the same site; lately headquarters of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group and earmarked for reconstruction]]
thumb|The first Mitsubishi building recreated in 2009 on original location, home of [[Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum, Tokyo|Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum]]
The was a major Japanese bank headquartered in Tokyo, founded in 1880. For much of the 20th century it was one of the largest Japanese banks, together with Dai-Ichi Bank, Mitsui Bank, Sumitomo Bank, and Yasuda / Fuji Bank. It served as the main bank for the Mitsubishi conglomerate. By 1929, Mitsubishi Bank had only 3 offices outside of Japan and its colonies, less than Mitsui bank or Sumitomo Bank and much less than the Yokohama Specie Bank, Bank of Chōsen and Bank of Taiwan, for which foreign trade was part of a public-interest mandate under special legislation.
During World War II, Mitsubishi Bank was a financier of Japanese interests in Manchuria through its branch in Dalian, opened in 1933. Its London and New York offices closed during the war, but reopened in 1953.
In 1969, Mitsubishi and Dai-Ichi Bank, Japan's oldest bank, began preparations for a merger, which would have led to a major regrouping in the bank-led keiretsu system of the era. But the plan met opposition among Dai-Ichi's management and its customers in the Furukawa and Kawasaki groups, who feared that Mitsubishi would dominate the combined bank and that their businesses would be absorbed by the relatively strong Mitsubishi group. As a result, the merger was called off. Two years later, Dai-Ichi merged with Nippon Kangyo Bank to form Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank.
Mitsubishi was known as a very conservative lender and was one of the few Japanese banks to emerge from the Japanese asset price bubble relatively unscathed. It acquired the Nippon Trust Bank in 1994.
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File:Sawara-mitsubishikan,katori-city,japan.JPG|Former branch building in Katori, Chiba
File:Kobe familiar hall01s3200.jpg|Former branch building in Kobe
File:Kyu-Mitsubishi-Bank-Kyoto-Branch-19990926.jpg|Former branch building in Kyoto, photographed in 1999
File:At Kyoto 2024 138.jpg|The same building in 2024 following partial reconstruction
File:Former Mitsubishi Bank Otaru Branch01s3.jpg|Former branch building in Otaru, Hokkaido
File:Former Mitsubishi Bank Building Shanghai.JPG|Former branch building in Shanghai, lately a branch of the China Postal Savings and Remittance Bureau
</gallery>
Notable alumni
- Zentaro Kosaka, politician and Japanese foreign minister
- Makoto Usami, Bank of Japan president
See also
- List of banks in Japan